


Purple Fireflies

by JackTheWolf



Series: Purple Fireflies [2]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Mild Blood, Mild Gore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-31
Updated: 2018-10-31
Packaged: 2019-08-11 13:16:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16476278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JackTheWolf/pseuds/JackTheWolf
Summary: When Gabriel was three, he started noticing things, little things, in the corners of his big brown eyes.





	Purple Fireflies

**Author's Note:**

> So i ended up writing more of this au thingy...  
> In this part, you get to know a little about Gabriel and his years growing up.

When Gabriel was three, he started noticing things, _little things_ , in the corners of his big brown eyes. Bottomless shadows licking longer than the others, fluffy birds with _too many_ glassy eyes flying hidden between thin tree-branches, clouds that seems to _fall_ to the ground painted with the vivid hues of dusk or dawn. He didn’t know _then_ , and he was written off as a boy with just _a little_ too big of an imagination. His ma helped him differentiate between real and fantasy, guiding him away from pink smoke and purple fireflies.

When Gabriel was five, the _first_ of the three big wars broke out overseas. He held his ma’s hand _tightly_ as they watched his pa enter the enormous armoured train, clueless but sad eyes following the shrinking form as it thundered north into the black night. With the pink smoke and purple fireflies _dancing behind_ , they left the grey city and their little home to live with his ma’s parent in a village as old as the culture surrounding him. Despite living together in the cramped house, he rarely _saw_ the wrinkled small woman who his ma called his abuela. The tiny lady would leave before sunrise every morning and come back after he fell asleep. Where she went and what she was doing was something he was promised to know when he grew _older_ , and Gabriel was happy enough with that.

When Gabriel was seven, the strict lady with perfect teeth living on the other side of the road started home-schooling him. She taught him geography, literature, geology and science. Gabriel _excelled_ in his subjects, and it wasn’t long before they went on to math, calligraphy, music and art. The kids in the neighbourhood would gather around and listen to him play the last thing he learned on his adult guitar, or make him tell stories about _foreign land_ s, and sometimes tell them the tales and old stories from the books he read. They would play around like normal kids _as well_ , and Gabriel would invent new games for them with sticks and stones when they ran out of toys or had to wait until their parents had enough money to repair what little they _had_ , but Gabriel was happy. The pink smoke and purple fireflies kept to themselves, on the edges of the town, among the dark trees of the forests.

When Gabriel was nine, the bottomless shadows licking longer than the others and the fluffy birds with _too many_ glassy eyes returned the night of his birthday. He woke that night _screaming_ his throat raw and bloody, him ma’s arms holding him tight against her chest while she sang to him. That morning was the first time he _met_ his abuela, tiny crooked woman with eyes _glassy and deep_ with wisdom and age sitting on a chair in their modest kitchen, home-woven fabrics in bright colours and many necklaces full of dried herbs hanging off her thin frame. He doesn’t remember the rest of that day, _or the day after_ , but for the first time in his short life the visions in the corners of his black eyes _disappeared_.

When Gabriel was eleven, he came downstairs after his language lessons with his teacher to find his ma crying on the sofa, torn pieces of crinkly paper the _officials_ used with flowing ink and letters in scatters on their rug. That was the _second_ time he met his abuela; they held his ma together there on the floor as she cried until her voice _gave out_ , Gabriel listening as the elder spoke with a barely there voice in a language that made his mind conjure pictures of leaves whisking in the air and branches fluttering in the wind. Later, he learned that his pa had died in the war, and that there wasn’t enough left of him to send back for the funeral. After the ceremony, his ma told him that she would be working with his abuela, that he would see her _less and less_ as she slowly took over the elder’s work. He didn’t cry, because she said that it was _important_ work, and that abuela had a lot to teach her before _she_ could work, just like his teacher had a lot of things to teach him before he could work.

When Gabriel was thirteen, two things of incredible significance to his life happened. _Firstly_ , the first of the three big wars ended, and all the soldiers and people of the army _came home_. The town became filled with life in a way he had _never_ seen before, and new faces of those belonging to the people he already knew filled his daily life with new experiences and events. That year, all the previous coy festivities and holidays became _coloured_ with bright lights and fleeting music, twirling crowds and singing faces. The following years were filled with joy and culture and exploration, the hunger for knowledge and experiences that he never knew he had _awoke_ , and he was happy.

But then, the second thing of incredible significance to his life happened. One night he stayed up _much_ later than usual, completely engrossed in a book about the human anatomy and the progress of death in the body from various epidemic diseases. The moon was high and full on the clear night sky, shining silver light in through his open window for him to use as he read, and he _should_ have remembered to close it, to close the heavy curtains and be asleep under the covers of his bed. He _shouldn’t_ be working himself up with the excitement of learning something new, just-awoken hormones racing through his bright blood as his mind absorbed information with utter joy. He _should_ be asleep and with is window shut, because as his knowledge rapidly grew, fuelled by hunger and eagerness, Gabriel was blind to the pink smoke and purple fireflies slowly crowding in above his head, gliding among the pillars holding the roof up, fluttering and dancing and basking in his presence.

The next thing he remembers is engulfing _black_ darkness and blinding _bright_ pain blooming from his hands, his arms, his feet, his back, _his head_ , air sharp and cold barely slipping in between his gasping lips as he swallowed mouthfuls of _his own_ dark blood. He’s holding the ripped up remains of his mother, her hollow eyes staring and at the same time _not looking at him_ glassily as he cradles her severed head. He remembers looking up and only seeing bright _purple_ and _red_ and _yellow_ fireflies dancing around him fanatically, black flames and smoke licking at his feet and up against the ceiling, horrid screams and inhuman growling echoing from _dozens_ of different sources around him.

And his abuela, voice thundering like her tiny body is conjuring and forcing out deafening soundwaves of some demonic snarling language, standing _completely_ , _unnaturally_ straight before him as non-existent air whips her heavy robes in _violent twirls_ around her lithe body, _blood red_ eyes glinting and _black claws_ twitching.

 _Later,_ he deduces that he must have fainted. His abuela told him that she had carried him to bed sometime later, tucked him in and closed the curtains on the broken window. Come morning, she woke him up and forced him to drink something _bitter_ before he could even blink his eyes open, and then wrapped him up in a robe similar to her home-woven one. Then he was forcefully _dragged_ out of their small house, dark eyes lingering on broken windows and wrecked furniture, deep scratches on the smashed walls and _gore_ littering various surfaces.

When Gabriel was fifteen, his abuela had taught him the art of herbs and nature, on how to make oils to coat his scent and ointments to hide the blackness on _his fingertips_ and around _his eyes_. She taught him about their cursed family, how early deaths from unnatural accidents haunted their existence. And she told him about how _clueless_ they have always been, that she doesn’t know _why_ they can see these bright purple and red and yellow fireflies or fluffy birds with too many glassy eyes. She doesn’t know why they _hunger_ so for knowledge and experiences, why the thrill and satisfaction of _consuming_ books and exploring makes pink smoke appear and wisp around them. She doesn’t know why it is, that when they _hunger_ for these unnatural pleasures, their eyes _darken_ around the edges, black claws _grow_ on their hands and feet, red _seeps_ into their eyes and glint in the moonlight like cats in the dark.

And she doesn’t know _what_ attacks them, why it _hunts_ them when the moon blooms full on the last harvest of the year, the last day of the wait. She knows how to look for the _beasts_ , how to hide from them, how to throw them off their trail before the night of the hunt. Gabriel wants to know why they _hunt_ for them, what is so prey-worthy about _him?_ His abuela tells him that those of the family that tried to seek that knowledge always died gruesome deaths, that their scents and the pink smoke around them grew especially potent with _that kind_ of wisdom.

When Gabriel was seventeen, he had survived _four_ of the damned nights of the hunts, but not without a couple of new scars on his developing body. He starts working out daily to build more muscle to better _protect_ himself. He has removed all and any books from their home and spends most days out in their shack in the forest, tending their herbs and weaving clothes from specific fibres that hides his scent better than normal ones does. He eats two meals each day out in the forest, to keep the smell of food _out_ of their home, and crafts oils and ointments in their shack, to keep the odours from _seeping_ into their walls and furniture. Three times a week he babysits the neighbourhoods’ kids in the evenings, on the weekends he plays the instruments in the local bar, and whenever they need extra money he cooks at the local restaurant, to the owner’s joy as she _loves_ his food and would probably marry him if he didn’t _actively_ ignore her – and if she wasn’t already a mother and married to a loving husband.

When Gabriel was nineteen, the _second_ of the three great wars broke out overseas. As all men of his age, the military called him in for service. His abuela did everything she could to keep him home, _as did he_ , but in the end, he was faced with jail or joining. He almost chose jail, as it was safer on _that_ cursed day of the year, but his abuela pressed him to accepting the recruitment, she didn’t want her only living relative to _rot_ away behind bars.

And despite everything, from the day he received his dog-tags, he found himself quickly rising through the ranks, and actively enjoying his work as _Sergeant G. Reyes_. He gained a reputation for his dangerous mind, his photographic memory, his _unnerving_ sixth sense of human cues and ability to read anyone with _a glance_. And of course, his almost _unnatural_ combat abilities.

He found himself almost _drunk_ on the feeling of feeding on all these new experiences and knowledge, riding a high that seemed to strengthen his body _beyond_ what it should be capable of, pink smoke darkening as wisps of _red_ starts staining its edges. His blackened fingers and eyes has been almost normal in colour since he joined, so he hasn’t had to make ointments to cover those up for a _long_ while. And as one of his rank, he has the power to get himself a room within an underground bunker to _hide_ for the damned night of the hunt, keeping him safer than he _ever_ has been in his life. He manages to do the same the next year.

When Gabriel was twenty-one, the _third_ thing of incredible significance in his life happened; he was selected for a special soldier enchantment program, a high-security, tight-kept secret program. He initially refused the order but, _he was told he had no choice on the matter_ , as it was part of his devoted service to his country.


End file.
